It Is You I Have Loved All Along
by KatelynnBB
Summary: Wade protected Layla from her abusive stepfather when she was growing up, but now that he has found her again can he protect her from a similar threat? Will she let him? *ONESHOT* Friendship/Angst but also romance...


**ALL NAMES, AND CHARACTERS BELONG TO WWE!**

**ONESHOT! WADE/LAYLA. **

Wade walked backstage after his match. He had just taken a serious beating from Randy. His body protesting with his every step. He turned a corner and walked past a dark hallway. He reached back to rub his shoulder before he heard something. It was a woman's voice. He backed up a few steps and looked down the hall.

"Anyone there?" he called out while peering into the darkness. He heard nothing for a few moments until footsteps sounded towards him. Layla came out of the darkness. Her mascara was running down her dark cheeks, and she had a strange red mark on her face. If Wade didn't know any better he'd say she'd been hit.

She rushed past him and hurried down the corridor. Wade reached out to take her arm as she passed but she slipped from his grasp, not later than that he heard someone else coming down the hall. He turned his attention back to the darkness. He was more than a little shocked at the man who now stood before him.

"Hey Wade."

"Hey Ryan."

Wade and Ryan had known eachother since they were on NXT together, and later as part of the NEXUS. He was called Skip Sheffield back then, but now he was going by Ryback.

"What was that about with Layla?" Wade asked.

"Come on bro, a man doesn't discuss what he does with a lady in the dark." Was Ryback's reply.

"She didn't look very happy as she ran past me..." Wade said while jutting a thumb in the direction she ran.

Ryback shrugged his shoulders. "Sometimes she needs a little convincing."

"Please tell me you aren't serious, bro." Wade said.

"Listen _Wade _it isn't any of your business what I do, or who I do it with. I recommend you mind your own business and stay out of mine." He gave Wade a little shove in the chest before walking out.

Wade couldn't shake the sick feeling he had in his gut. Even now, 3 hours later, it was still eating at him. He raised himself from his hotel bed and walked to the bathroom. He turned on the faucet and splashed cold water on his face before toweling it dry. He stared back at his reflection. Before finally deciding to do what he had wanted to do all night.

Layla and he had a history, and not a very pretty one. They sort of grew up together back in England. They had been next door neighbors, and sometimes as a teenager she would sleep over at his house to get away from her abusive stepfather. Wade had seen various bruises, hidden from plain view. The only obvious indicator of abuse to the outside world was a busted lip one summer when she was fifteen.

But they had grown apart as Wade got older. He had started street fighting, trying to prove he was a man. She was sleeping over one night and making her way down the hall to the bathroom in the dead of night when he got home. He scared her as he quietly slipped up the stairs to his room, bumping into her. She opened the bathroom door, and the light spilled onto his face. Beaten, and bloody.

She gasped and begged him to stop, but it was something he said he would never give up. Eventually, his fighting came in between their friendship, and he couldn't understand why until one night in a rage she had shouted the truth at him. "You're just like him! You have to hit people to make yourself feel good! You are _just like HIM!_"

That night she had ran back to the house where she suffered endless hours of abuse. She stopped taking comfort in their friendship because he had broken her trust. And shattered the comforting image she had of him. That had been the breaking point for Wade.

He ran away from home, and started scraping his living by fighting on the streets. He made a pretty good go of it until one night he was flipping through the channels and his gaze landed on one Layla El. He knew then and there what he was going to do.

And he had done it, gotten here, worked hard. Kicked a lot of butts. Made a lot of friends. Some enemies, but never once had he spoken to Layla. She'd slapped him in the ring a year ago in a mixed tag match, but every time he tried to talk to her she refused.

So when he found himself knocking on her door at midnight he was surprised when she opened it wider and allowed him to come in. She let the door close behind her and leaned against it. There was a dark bruise forming on her delicate jaw.

"Why are you here?" she asked in a whisper.

He walked slowly towards her and layed his fingertips across her jaw in a feather light touch.

"This..." She pushed his big hand away. He walked furthur towards her and she wished she could disappear into the door as she leaned against it.

"Are we back there again? Why Layla?"

"Its not as if I have a choice! You think I would even still be walking if I had said no to him? Better to say yes and take a few hits!" she whispered venomously as she stalked past him and sat on the edge of the bed.

He followed her and stood before her, hands on his hips. "You don't know me anymore. I guess you never really did..." she said as a tear fell from her brown eyes.

He kneeled down so he was now eye level to her. "I know you better than anyone here. Better than anyone ever has, and you know it. I've missed you. I've wanted to apologize for so long Layla. I was young, I was stupid. I let you go, and I was wrong."

He touched a palm to her cheek lovingly.

"I'm not leaving your side ever again." He touched his forehead to her's and she completely leaned into him, falling into his arms, breathing in the scent of her old friend.

"There is something else I've been wanting to tell you for a long time."

Before she could ask what he firmly pressed his lips to her's. "I love you."

She smiled as much as she could with her jaw throbbing, "I already know that. I love you too."


End file.
